1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a technique for creating a multi-viewpoint image from a plurality of original images and printing same onto a lenticular sheet.
2. Background Technology
One practically applied technique for stereoscopically representing an image makes use of binocular disparity. For example, with a lenticular image, image strips are cut from each of a plurality of original images that have been captured from mutually different points of view and are arranged side by side in sequential order depending on the arrangement of the point of view to create a composite image with parallax; by presenting this composite image via a lenticular lens, a parallax is created between the respective images that reach the left and right eyes, such that the subject appears to be three-dimensional. Also, with a lenticular image composited from a plurality of original images of entirely different content, it is possible to bring about a visual effect where the content of the image that appears varies depending on the viewing direction.
When such a lenticular image is being created, it is desirable to ascertain beforehand what visual effect will be obtained by printing, because lenticular sheets are costly and also because, depending on the quality of the original images, in some cases a proper visual effect can not be obtained. In view whereof, in, for example, a technique described in Patent Document 1, stripes of images created from original images to be composited are composited so as to be alternately arranged side by side and are displayed as a two-dimensional image, thereby making it possible for a user to recognize the final stereoscopic image.    Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2004-129186 (for example, FIG. 7) (Patent Document 1) is an example of the related art.